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Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help"
From: |
Stephen J. Turnbull |
Subject: |
Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help" |
Date: |
Thu, 30 Sep 2004 11:48:23 +0900 |
User-agent: |
Gnus/5.1006 (Gnus v5.10.6) XEmacs/21.5 (chayote, linux) |
>>>>> "Miles" == Miles Bader <address@hidden> writes:
Miles> Hmm, well Tom was advocating for a gdb-style interactive
Miles> help system in tla... (actually not a bad idea -- it's
Really? Unlike gdb, tla is not normally an interactive program.
Miles> often easier to write "documentation" of this sort, where
Miles> you can keep the doc strings close to the source, and
Miles> organize them programmatically, than it is to write real
Miles> manuals)
But "programmatic organization" can be done in batch just as well as
interactively. With proper indexing and xref'ing, a "tla CMD --info"
command that invokes "info tla CMD", where the CMD node is
autogenerated from the same doccomment that the corresponding "tla CMD
-H" string is, but also leaves you in an info browser after displaying
the node, and provides xrefs and footnotes, seems to me a better
(== cheaper and faster to implement) idea than homegrown interactive
doc facilities. Especially given how bad gdb's online help sucks.
Info isn't perfect, but it's a much better help authoring and browsing
system than HTML, at least with current HTML bowsers. The two big
advantages of HTML up to now (multimedia and noob-fiendly-ness) are
both disappearing, and fairly rapidly AFAICT, with the addition of
image support to Texinfo and toolbars etc to many standalone and
Emacsen-based info browsers. And if you really must have HTML[1],
there are several Texinfo-to-HTML converters that do a reasonable job,
whereas HTML-to-Texinfo converters invariably leave a lot to be
desired (eg, disbanding the W3C comes immediately to mind ;-).
Missing-Rs-are-all-deliberate-ly y'rs
Footnotes:
[1] Actually, yes, I think it's necessary for the Arch home page
and/or wiki.
--
Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp
University of Tsukuba Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN
Ask not how you can "do" free software business;
ask what your business can "do for" free software.
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", (continued)
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Zenaan Harkness, 2004/09/28
- Message not available
- Message not available
- Message not available
- Message not available
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] "Newbie-ized help", James Blackwell, 2004/09/28
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] "Newbie-ized help", Cameron Patrick, 2004/09/28
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] "Newbie-ized help", James Blackwell, 2004/09/29
- [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Miles Bader, 2004/09/29
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] "Newbie-ized help", Aaron Bentley, 2004/09/26
- [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Mark Stosberg, 2004/09/26
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Miles Bader, 2004/09/26
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Zenaan Harkness, 2004/09/26
- [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Miles Bader, 2004/09/26
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help",
Stephen J. Turnbull <=
- [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Miles Bader, 2004/09/29
- [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Stephen J. Turnbull, 2004/09/30
- [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Miles Bader, 2004/09/30
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", James Blackwell, 2004/09/30
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Stephen J. Turnbull, 2004/09/30
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", James Blackwell, 2004/09/30
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Robin Green, 2004/09/30
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Adrian Irving-Beer, 2004/09/30
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Aaron Bentley, 2004/09/30
- Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Re: "Newbie-ized help", Zenaan Harkness, 2004/09/30